User:Patrick2011b/FoVM^Ru

Version 0.30: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

This page is a Diary of a Crawler, the journal of an individual character. This page probably contains spoilers.

This is a diary of my attempt to play a Formicid Venom Mage. I've played a few melee Formicids before, but this will be the first time I've played the species as a caster, so it'll be interesting to see how stasis will work with a build that's better off at range. I've also never played Venom Mage before, so I'll get to see how well poison spells work in the early game for the first time. My plan going in is something like this:

• Train Poison Magic enough to get Olgreb's Toxic Radiance online, which will allow full-LOS poisoning.
• Branch out into another skill relatively early depending on what I find in the dungeon. Options include:
  • Fire Magic if I find Ignite Poison, as this combos well with poison spells. It would help to find other fire spells as well if I go this route.
  • Transmutations if I find Spider Form and rPois jewelry. This would give me a viable melee option in the early game, though I would want a better form and/or Unarmed Combat training for the Lair.
  • A weapon skill if I find a really good weapon early. In this case, I would still see value in Mephitic Cloud and OTR, and it may be worth training a little Air Magic or Conjurations to get the former online.
• Worship an early god if it's any good. Formicids have +2 Invocations aptitude, which opens up skill-dependent gods like Fedhas, Makhleb, and Nemelex. A faded altar would be useful here, as there are plenty of viable gods for this combo.

The last point is spoiled by the title, but read on to find out why I ended up with Ru.

The morgue can be found here.

Previous Attempts

As my user page says, I won't post a diary until I get to the Lair, but I thought it would be useful to give a little info from any unsuccessful attempts at this combo, so here it is:

• My first attempt got 2 rings (slaying and evasion) and a faded altar of Sif Muna on D:1 but was ruined by sourceless malevolence on D:2, as it was a shaft to D:4. Blind-quaffing a potion of might was enough to defeat an orc band with no priests, but a jelly turned out to be too much. Meleeing a jelly at low level is a bad idea, as its acid damage is quite high.

Pre-Lair

Before getting to actual play, I'll go over what I start with:

• +0 robe
• potion of magic
• Stats: 12 Strength, 14 Intelligence, 14 Dexterity
• Spells: Sting, Poisonous Vapours, Mephitic Cloud, Olgreb's Toxic Radiance
• Skills (with aptitudes): Dodging 2 (-1), Stealth 2 (+3), Spellcasting 2 (+0), Transmutations 1 (+1), Poison Magic 3 (+3)
• Initial Training: Poison Magic only

D:1

I enter the dungeon seeing a room with shallow water and a spiraling walkway with a potion just outside. To the southwast is a jackal, which tends to spawn in groups, so I try the northeast, where I sense a monster behind a door and two more behind some walls. Some more exploring reveals a jackal, so I try the door. A kobold is behind the door, wielding a whip. It takes 3 castings of Sting to kill it, but once I do, I take the whip, which does more damage than untrained fists. A little exploration to the east reveals a third group of jackals, so I try the two sensed monsters to the northeast of the entrance. The first one is a kobold with a short sword. Fortunately, the terrain allows me to fight the monsters one at a time. The other monster is a hobgoblin, but I needed 2 Stings to kill the kobold, so I step back a bit to rest before fighting the hobgoblin. The hobgoblin follows me into a room and dies easily, then a rat shows up with a sensed monster approaching me from the narrow walkway. I kill the rat and sense another monster in the next room. I rest, and as I'm about to leave a room, a frilled lizard and an endoplasm show up on opposite sides. Neither of them have noticed me yet, so I approach the lizard and Sting it to death, which alerts the endoplasm. The endoplasm will be tough, as it has rPois and relatively high damage for D:1, so I retreat and pick up the short sword to avoid giving up double turns due to the whip's 1.1 base delay (I have no weapon skills right now).

While getting the short sword, I seem to have eluded the endoplasm, so I push on and find a bat and a potion of magic. The bat gets me to XL 2, and a ball python shows up. A little more exploration gets 5 monsters in view: a rat, 2 kobolds, a ball python, and a bat. The rat is in front, so I Sting it, but I'll need to retreat to avoid fighting multiple monsters at once. I manage to kill the rat, ball python, and one of the kobolds, at which point I see that Dodging is at level 2 because I forgot to set my skill training. I fix that before continuing. A dart slug shows up outside of Sting's range, so I have to reposition. I do so and kill the dart slug and a rat that appeared from the south. At this point, I memorize Poisonous Vapours (I'll abbreviate it to PV), but I won't cast it yet as it's at 14% failure. This D:1 appears to be full of monsters, which means I'll get plenty of XP. I'm already 60% of the way to XL 3, and I know of at least 3 groups of jackals.

A bat and an endoplasm later, I find a scroll shop. I only have 11 gold so far, but this should come in handy later. I decide to check out the shop to see what it has, and its contents are as follows:

• Scroll of blinking for 82: Not usable by Formicids.
• Scroll of brand weapon for 104: Useful if I feel like switching to a weapon skill, but I'm not going to spend 104 gold to brand a low-tier weapon for a caster.
• Scroll of enchant weapon for 82: Pretty much like the above, though a brand is more valuable than +1 enchantment.
• 2 scrolls of immolation for 44 each: Immolation has a few uses, but I think there are better uses for gold.
• Scroll of magic mapping for 82: I like to magic map branch ends, so this could come in handy.
• Scroll of torment for 104: Pass.
• 2 scrolls of vulnerability for 44 each: These are used to hex dangerous monsters, though doing so is risky against monsters that can hex. I tend to avoid the scroll in practice, so I would only buy this for ID.

The next 3 monsters are a frilled lizard, a hobgoblin, and an endoplasm. These are enough to get me to XL 3. I take Intelligence for my stat points since I'm a caster background and haven't found a reason to switch out of casting. My next find of note is a ring several tiles away from a book shop. The ring is a ring of resist corrosion, something I wish I had on the previous attempt as that one was killed by a jelly. The book shop will have to wait, as books costs hundred of gold pieces. To the south of the book shop is a gnoll with a spear. I try to move away, but the gnoll notices me while in sight. I don't feel ready for this fight, but I see no way out of it, so I start with a PV, which works. Another casting gives it a second stack of poison, which gives me a chance to retreat. The poison doesn't quite kill the gnoll, so I cast PV again to kill it. Poison Magic goes to 5, and I pick up the spear as well as a potion, a scroll, and 19 gold, which the gnoll dropped. I drop the whip since the spear is a better 1.1 delay weapon. I'm still wielding the short sword for now, as I have a ranged option and don't want to give up double turns. I go back to where the gnoll was and find yet another pack of jackals. Without an AoE option, I'll need to use the terrain to avoid being swarmed, but jackals should be easy 1v1 fights at this point.

The jackals go down pretty easily, so I feel confident I can finish off D:1 without too much trouble. D:1 has so many monsters that I get to XL 4, which is pretty rare for D:1. The random stat turns out to be Strength this time, which won't do much if remain a caster. I finish D:1 without any further trouble, and I find a leather armour at the end. My failure rates are now 4% for Sting and 10% for PV. The leather increases these to 6% and 12%, and my EV is 12 either way. My 13 Str must be doing something, then.

D:2

The first downstairs I take is next to a vault with a bunch of metal and crystal pillars, but nothing dangerous so far. I'm wearing leather armour now, so my AC is 3, which is at least a slight improvement over the 2 I had to start the game. I clear the vault with ease, but then I encounter an adder. Adders are considered dangerous for D:2, but they don't have poison resistance. Due to lack of identified consumables, I decide not to engage this one. The next set of monsters I do fight demonstrate something tactically useful: Sting doesn't auto-hit, so if multiple monsters are in a corridor, casting Sting into that corridor might miss the monster in front and poison the one behind, which will soften it up for when the one in front dies.

Some more exploration reveals Terence. Fighting a unique on D:2 with limited resources is generally a bad idea, so I retreat and explore another part of the level. The next encounter of note is a second adder behind some deep water. Adders can swim, so the deep water is no help. I decide to avoid the adder for now. Crazy Yiuf is also on this level, but he's behind a runed door, so I won't fight him yet. I find a 3rd adder and run out of places to explore, so I decide to try this one. PV is at 11% failure, but it has full LOS range, so I use it twice on the adder, miscasting once. A little retreating gets it to Sting range, so I cast that to soften it up and finish it before it can get an attack off. That worked out pretty well, but it could've been a lot worse, so I'll avoid the other 2 adders for as long as possible, which is not long at all. Fortunately, the next adder dies just as easily, and I find a ring, which turns out to be a +6 ring of intelligence. That brings my failure rates down to 3% (Sting) and 7% (PV). OTR is at 12% failure, so I memorize it before fighting the 3rd adder. This uses up all of my spell levels, so I'll need to level up some more before getting more spells. OTR is "extremely dangerous", and I only have 30 HP, so I turn on Fighting to get some more HP. The last adder gets me to XL 5. I can't get past the deep water and still don't feel ready for Terence, so I go down to D:3.

D:3

This level seems to have a bunch of hallways. The first item of interest is a staff, which turns out to be conjuration. I take it for now in case I find some Conjurations spells. Since I have none of those right now, I'll keep using the short sword. Multiple scrolls and a randart book are to the west of the staff with some lava behind them. The book has Lee's Rapid Deconstruction and Statue Form. Those are both mid-level Earth Magic spells, so they give me something to switch to if I find some lower-level Earth spells. A +2 aptitude would make the switch relatively easy, but I decide not to do that yet, leaving Poison Magic and Fighting on. Later on, I find a starred upstair, which probably leads somewhere closer to Terence, so I don't take it. An orc band show up and drops a morningstar, which isn't of much use unless I train Maces & Flails due to a 1.5 base delay. A pair of boots brings my AC to 4.

An orc spawns with a +1 vampiric hand axe and a chain mail. Neither of them do much for me, as a hand axe is a waste of the vampiric brand, and chain mail is way too heavy for me to cast spells without more Str and Armour training. A phantom is the first nasty monster I see (read: it's worth more XP than Terence). Phantoms aren't that dangerous by themselves, but their blink with makes it risky for non-Formicids to fight them when other monsters are around. The blinking doesn't apply here, but their poison immunity pretty much limits me to melee, so I avoid the phantom for now.

Near the lava vault is a vault with crystal walls and a green floor. It's guarded by an adder, which is easily poisoned. At the end is an altar of Hepliaklqana. I don't consider Hep ideal for this build, so I leave it alone for now. The lava vault has an altar of Ru, which I like better on melee characters than casters since more sacrifices are viable for the former. The Temple could be just 1 floor down, so I'm going to finish D:3 before making a decision on god choice.

Robin shows up in a relatively safe spot (i.e. a long hallway). Goblins and hobgoblins aren't dangerous when not buffed, and OTR is still "quite dangerous" and at 10% failure, so I decide to PV Robin to take them out ASAP. Three castings take Robin to max poison, then the goblins go into a battle-frenzy, making the encounter more dangerous. I try to retreat to avoid 2/3 of attacks, but Robin throws a goblin in my way. Robin dies from the poison, taking my Fighting skill to 2 and leaving me free to retreat, at least until the battle-frenzy goes away. I take a +3 short sword of protection off of Robin, which is an upgrade. The protection brand will give me +7 AC in combat, which is useful in the early game but doesn't scale well. A pair of gloves brings my AC to 5, which will be increased to 12 when I activate the protection brand. A little later, I find a ring mail. While putting it on to test my failure rates with it, a goblin appears. I now have 7 AC, 11 EV, and 4/11/16% failure for Sting/PV/OTR. The failure is higher than I'd like, but at least I have decent AC and melee now.

Ru, Terence, and the phantom

D:3 is mostly explored, so it's time to re-evaluate god choice. I have access to Ru and Hep altars. The latter would give me an ally I can shoot through, but I'm not going with Ranged Weapons, and PV and OTR don't care about that, so I don't like that choice. Ru is pretty useful, though I like it better on melee characters. There's a small chance of a faded altar on the remainder of D:2, so Ru would at least be free to abandon in that case, so I decide to join Ru. I also just reached XL 6 and have 7.1 in Poison Magic and 2.1 in Fighting. I could turn Stealth on to improve stabs and encounter avoidance with help from a +3 aptitude, but I'd rather get my failure rates lower first. Mephitic Cloud could give me some stabs, so I turn Conjurations on to get it online faster. As for consumables, I haven't used any of them, but I do have a stack of 4 potions, two stacks of 4 scrolls each, and a stack of 3 scrolls. I'm going to save the ID minigame for D:4, and I'll buy a scroll of magic mapping before going there.

With the evaluation done, I decide to fight the phantom first to get a bunch of XP and maybe find something behind it. The phantom is poison immune, so I just melee it. The fight takes a while, but I manage to destroy it and get Conjurations to 1. Next is Terence. Two castings of PV get him decently poisoned, so I retreat to let the poison do its work. He dies and drops a wand of flame, which is the first wand I've found. I buy the scroll of magic mapping from the D:1 scroll shop, and it turns out I had none of those.

D:4

Behind Terence was a scroll I had 4 of, so I start from reading from the stack of 5. It's a scroll of identify, so I use this stack to identify the following:

• 4 potions of heal wounds
• a potion of curing
• a potion of mutation
• a potion of haste
• 4 scrolls of teleportation

I drop the potion of haste and scrolls of teleportation, as Formicids can't use those. The stack of 3 scrolls turn out to be scrolls of vulnerability, so I go back upstairs to wait out the Will/2 status. I have 5 single unidentified scrolls, so I leave those for now. The first encounter of note in D:4 is Eustachio, a unique I would avoid if he was asleep, but he noticed me. I begin with 3 castings of PV, miscasting once. Eustachio drinks a potion of haste, summons a rat, and blinks after I sting him. I kill the summoned rat to activate protection then Sting him twice to get him to max poison. Eustachio gets a bunch of summons off while poisoned, and an adder shows up. The poison eventually kills Eustachio, getting me to Fighting 3, Conjurations 2, and XL 7. The adder is pretty easy as this point, so I kill it and take another look at my failure rates, which are now 4/9/11% for Sting/PV/OTR. Mephitic Cloud is at 22% failure, so I'm not going to memorize it just yet.

D:4 is light on monsters, but it does have an assorted antiques shop. Most of the stuff is uninteresting, but there are a couple scrolls of identify and two of the same unidentified potion. I don't have enough gold to buy all of those items, so I leave the shop for now. A book adds Passwall and Ensorcelled Hibernation to my library. The latter is a semi-useful way to get stabs early, but it doesn't scale well, and I'm not sure Hexes is the way I want to go. The next notable find is a wand of charming, which could help break up groups. A dart slug guards a ring of wizardry, which is very useful for a caster, though my library is somewhat lacking. I put it on, keeping the rCorr ring as a swap. This brings Mephitic Cloud down to 9% failure, so I memorize it now. My first chance to cast it is an encounter with a kobold and an iguana. The kobold is confused and killed by a low-tier stab, while the iguana avoids confusion and takes a little more work. Poison Magic is now at 8. The last monster is a scorpion, which takes 2 castings of PV to kill.

D:5

The first monster is a hound, which I just melee as it enters LOS in melee range and does low damage. A scorpion manages to poison me, but I kill it and get Fighting to 4. Resting allows me to keep the potion of curing. Sourceless malevolence triggers an alarm far from any upstairs. At least I'm in a hallway, so my best move is to stay there and dig a kill hole if necessary. An orc wizard spawns with a robe of the Archmagi, which is quite useful for blasters, but spellpower doesn't matter that much for poison. The orc wizard also confuses me, but I have only 1 potion of curing and plenty of AC to fight orcs, so I remain confused until it wears off. I cast OTR for the first time when 4 orcs are in view, and it turns out to be quite powerful, killing an orc instantly and getting two others to multiple stacks. After the toxic status wears off, I notice the mark is gone, which should make the rest of the level easier as monsters have been attracted to a good tactical position. An orc priest eventually shows up, so I cast another OTR once it does, killing it before it can smite me. This is enough to get Conjurations 3 and XL 8. The random stat is Int, which helps my casting a bit. I pick up the robe of the Archmagi as well as a wand of acid and a +1 scale mail of willpower. I try on the scale mail, and I go from 7 AC/11 EV to 9 AC/9 EV. As for failure rates, Mephitic Cloud is at 16%, while the others are all at single digits. I'll wear the scale mail for now, as I like the willpower, and poison is working well enough for now.

During all of this, Ru has offered me a sacrifice. The choices are Eye, Drink, and Skill. Drink is essentially a bottom-tier mutation, so it's an easy pass. This leaves Skill and Eye. The former lowers all skills, while the latter makes it harder to hit. I'm lacking in EV-avoiding options other than PV and OTR, so I choose Skill and reach 1* of piety. This drops Dodging to 1, Conjurations to 2, and Poison Magic to 7. Failure rates aren't affected much, so it appears to be worth it for now.

The Temple appears in D:5. I just made a sacrifice to Ru, so I won't go there. An ice beast appears near the temple. I manage to use 3 charges of the wand of flame before it gets in melee range, but I only get it to moderately wounded before melee begins. AC proves to be useful here, as it only freezes me once. Killing the ice beast bring Conjurations to 3 and Poison Magic to 8. I use two scrolls of identify to ID 2 scrolls of enchant weapon and 2 scrolls of poison. Short swords are low-tier, so I'll hold on to the scrolls of enchant weapon for now. A pack of yaks appears later in this level, which is well out-of-depth. One of them follows me, but it's far enough away to die from multiple PV casts while I stay out of melee range. Another yak reaches the area I retreated to, and I don't have enough distance from it to PV it to death this time, so I try the wand of acid but miss twice. Two more charges hit it without killing or corroding it, but it's pretty close, so I try melee and finish it off to get Fighting to 5. Two more yaks appear north of the temple. Both are poisoned by OTR, then a jelly, an adder, and another yak show up. I cast OTR again, killing an adder and one of the yaks. I cast OTR one more time, then replace the ring of intelligence with a ring of rCorr so I can melee the jelly, which has rPois. The other yaks die from poison, bringing Conjurations to 4, Poison Magic to 9, and XL to 9. I take Int for my stat points again to help with casting. This brings Mephitic Cloud down to 11% failure in scale mail when I put my ring of intelligence back on.

I find a ghost vault, and I'll obviously save it for later. OTR takes care of an orc band near the vault, with one of the wizards dropping a +2 robe of fire resistance. When I switch to it, my defenses go from 9 AC/9 EV to 6 AC/12 EV, and spell failure becomes a non-issue. I'll wear this for now, but there are definitely situations where AC and will are more important, especially if I don't find better spells. A gnoll pack gets Fighting to 6 and drops 2 throwing nets, which may be useful. The last monster is a sleepcap, which puts me to sleep once but otherwise goes down fairly easily. The protection brand means I still have 13 AC in melee, even with the robe.

D:6

The first stairs I take lead to a large pack of monsters I've seen before. Only the white imp has rPois, so OTR should work well, though the two orc priests are a little scary since they can smite. I cast OTR, take a smite, then use the wand of charming on the white imp. The charm fails, and I lose toxic status, so I cast OTR again to kill the orc priests quicker. A jelly enters the area, so I decide swap in a ring of rCorr, only to find out I'm already wearing it. I kill the remaining monsters but go down to 33/69 HP in the process, so I go back up, rest, and switch the ring from rCorr to +6 Int. While resting, one of the yaks I thought I killed turned out to still be alive, so I kite it until I'm healed and then kill it. Some gold on D:6 prompts a detour to the D:4 shop. The potions turn out to be brilliance, and I also ID a stack of 2 scrolls, which turn out to be enchant armour. I save those for now.

Back in D:6, I encounter a bullfrog, which gets poisoned some, then an ice beast appears. I use 2 charges of flame on the ice beast, then attack the bullfrog to activate protection. I miss twice, then kill it, taking Conjurations to 5. I use 1 more charge of flame on the ice beast before it get in melee. Poison Magic reaches level 10. Mephitic Cloud is now at 9% failure with scale mail, so I put it on and turn Poison Magic and Conjurations off. Due to lack of spells, I decide to get better at stabbing, so I turn Short Blades and Stealth on. I'm not going to train defenses other than Fighting yet, but they'll eventually need training.

An interesting thing about D:6 is that all the walls are stone instead of rock. I find a +2 leather armour of poison resistance, which looks interesting. I test it out and go from 9 AC/9 EV to 7 AC/11 EV. This means I now have 3 body armors with similar defensive value but different resists. I can cast poison spells in any of them, though the scale mail reduces stealth. Due to slow swapping, I'll have to anticipate which resistance is more important and switch body armor accordingly. I go with the leather for now, which proves to be a good decision when I encounter an adder. Of course, the adder is easy by this point.

The next encounter of note is a group of wights. These should be more of a challenge, as they're immune to poison and have high damage. I move away and switch to the scale mail for more AC. When I return, two of them wake up, and I may have sensed a third, so I use the wand of acid in the hope of corroding them. It works quite well, destroying one and corroding the other, but I now have only 3 charges of acid. Two more wights appear, so I use another charge, destroying the 2nd wight and nearly destroying the others. The 3rd wight gets Short Blades to 1 and Stealth to 3. After killing a hound, I switch to the robe for more stealth and fire resistance.

The northwest part of D:6 is a Makhleb altar vault with Maggie, whose item spawns are quite dangerous. I picked the right armor, but Maggie is just too dangerous right now, so I retreat. The rest of the level is uneventful, so I switch to leather before going down.

D:7

The walls are rock again, and I immediately see a bullfrog, which takes several turns to kill. All 3 upstairs turn out to be pretty close, and a sky beast appears near the third one. I start by hitting it twice with PV to get it to max poison before going to melee. It stays visible the whole time, and killing it brings Fighting to 7. The first downstairs appears a bit later with a pack of 6 monsters behind a wall. I pick up a potion of mutation next to the stairs. The monsters turn out to be gnolls in a winding corridor. Poison and Mephitic Cloud take care of them. Short Blades goes to 2, and I reach XL 10. Dowan and Duvessa appear to the north, both spawning with mundane Short Blades. The map is such that only Dowan is in view, but I sense Duvessa next to him, so I cast Mephitic Cloud, confusing Dowan. A little retreating brings Duvessa across the fumes, and she's confused as well. Confusion separates the two, so I bring Duvessa into a corridor (Dowan moved away) and kill her with a combination of poison and melee, getting Stealth to 4. I only took minor damage, so I head back the way I came to deal with Dowan, and it turns out OTR almost killed him, so it only takes a single Sting.

The next encounter of note is a black bear in the same room as a ring of wizardry, an unidentified potion, and some gold. I PV it to max poison, then retreat. Although Ru stopped it a couple time, it still managed to get a few melee attacks off after going berserk. Ru offers a new sacrifice after I kill the bear, and the options this time are Essence (low MP), Arcana (Ice/Hexes/Necromancy), and Courage. Essence doesn't give much piety, Arcana would make it harder to get stabs in the future, and Courage would give me penalties in big fights. OTR, Mephitic Cloud, and Ru's abilities should mitigate those penalties, so I pick Courage, increasing my piety to 2*. This means enemies that damage be now have a chance to be debuffed. I leave the ring of wizardry for now, as spell failure isn't a problem at this point. The potion is a potion of might. Later in the dungeon, I find a "Neck Hole" shop, which seems like an unusual type. The shop has amulets, cloaks, and scarves. I only have 132 gold on entering, so I can't afford most of the items there. I could buy a +0 cloak for 63, but a scarf of repulsion costs 168, which seems much more useful. I put the scarf of repulsion in my shopping list and continue exploring. Sourceless malevolence triggers an alarm, but I'm almost done with D:7, so it's not a problem here. The remaining skill gains on the level are Short Blades to 3 and Stealth to 5.

Rudirect

Rudirect is a term I saw used on Discord to refer to Ru's aura causing a monster to attack itself. I've already seen this a few times, and the frequency will increase with piety, so I'm going to use this term from now on as a shorthand.

D:8

The first encounter consists of 3 howler monkeys and a bullfrog, which fall to poison spells. I find a staff of poison in the area and pick it up. I don't actually care about the spellpower that much, and it's not as good in melee as a +3 short sword of protection, at least in melee, so its only real use right now is the rPois, which would let me wear a different armor without losing rPois. My current setup works well enough for now, so I switch back to the short sword and keep the leather on. A kobold brigand and an acid dragon activate the Courage sacrifice for the first time, giving me Horr(-1). The acid dragon moves out of view just as I switch a ring from +6 Int to rCorr, so I don't actually have to deal with horror this time. After killing the kobold, I approach the acid dragon, which turns out not to have noticed me until just before I can stab it. I manage to kill it in melee, though I take some damage in the process. A second kobold brigand appears and goes down easily as I try to rest.

A vault with two parallel diagonal hallways takes me to a two-headed ogre, which is a "nasty" threat and triggers Horr(-2). I retreat some, but I can't avoid the ogre, so I cast OTR and Mephitic Cloud, killing an orc in front of it. The ogre gets a hit on me before being confused. Confusion gets me some distance, letting me cast Mephitic Cloud again to refresh the confusion. The ogre hits itself twice and dies as I leave its LOS, increasing Fighting to 8, Short Blades to 4, and Stealth to 6. The vault contains a spellbook that adds Foxfire, Fireball, Plasma Beam, and Starburst to my library. I finally have some blaster spells available. Fireball is at 45% failure with leather on, so it shouldn't take too long to get it online. I turn off Short Blades and Stealth, while enabling Conjurations and Fire Magic. I'm 2 spell levels short of being able to memorize Fireball, but I doubt it'll get to 10% failure before I gain those spell levels, so I leave Spellcasting off for now. With the new skill training set, I continue exploring the vault and one-hit a sky beast with a high-tier stab. As I come out of the vault, multiple orcs appear. As I cast OTR, an orc priest smites me, and an orc warrior hits me with an arbalest, taking me down to 57/80 HP. Two wolves appear, so I cast OTR again and retreat a bit. One of the wolves drops me to 35 HP, so I drink a potion of heal wounds to get back up to 58. By the time I'm done with the encounter, Fire Magic is increased to 1.

I return to the other side of the vault so I can go upstairs for the 2nd ring of wizardry, but Grum appears with a wolf. I try a combo of OTR/Mephitic Cloud, but the wolf being faster means I cast them in the wrong order. The wolf is confused, but Grum is not. Another casting of OTR and some retreating kills them both. Gastronok is to the east of where I entered and will be saved for later. At least I thought I could save him for later, but he blocked the upstairs as I tried to go another way. This means I'm stuck in D:8 for now. I end up exploring a large chunk of D:8 before I find another way up. Along the way, I found multiples of the same unidentified scroll, creating a stack of 4. I also have enough gold for the scarf of repulsion, and Fire Magic is now at 2. At D:7, I blind-read from the stack of 4, and it turns out to be amnesia. I forget Sting and quiver PV. While on D:7, I also switch to the scale mail for more AC.

Unfortunately, I take the wrong downstairs back to D:8, and Gastronok is nearby, so I go back up and try a different stair. There's still a little more of D:8 to explore, but Gastronok is so dangerous that I can't risk it, so I go down to D:9 ASAP.

D:9

The first monster on this level is a two-headed ogre. I poison and confuse it some, but it never hits itself, so I'm forced to retreat into unexplored territory. A troll appears, but at least I lose the ogre. I manage to PV it a couple times, but that doesn't do much, and I run out of MP. This one will require a risky melee fight. During the fight, the two-headed ogre returns, which will likely force multiple consumables. I use the wand of acid to corrode both the troll and the ogre, then I drink a potion of might, followed by heal wounds and magic. I then cast OTR, which kills the troll and brings me to XL 11. I kill the ogre soon after, getting Fighting to 9 and Fire Magic to 3. A couple yaks bring Conjurations to 6, then I encounter seven more, triggering the message Monsters! Monsters everywhere! You have to get out of here! Horror is at 6 at this point, meaning I have -6 slay and a large spellpower penalty. I eventually separate them and retreat into a corridor, but I still have to drink a potion of heal wounds, bringing me down to 2. Fire Magic is increased to 4 during the encounter. Since a lack of MP has proved to be an issue in this level, I turn Spellcasting on before continuing.

A huge pack of kobolds falls easily to OTR, and Ru offers a new sacrifice. The choices are Purity (-2 Dex), Love, and Nimbleness. I choose Love, as it offers a lot of piety for removing summons as an option. This sacrifice bring me all the way to 4* piety, unlocking Draw Out Power and Power Leap. I drop the wand of charming, as it's now useless. The kobolds were in a vault containing both an altar of The Shining One and an Inescapable Atlas, neither of which do anything for me. Another pack of kobolds to the south manages to force a potion of curing when I get hit with a curare dart. I then find a troll and stab it, and it drops a troll leather armour. The TLA doesn't interest me, as its defenses are inferior, and I can now get healing from Ru. A wyvern proves to be dangerous, but I kill it with the help of PV. D:9 is now complete, and I still don't feel ready for Gastronok, so I go down to D:10.

D:10

Just before I go down, I enchant my boots and gloves to +2 each and switch to leather, so I now have 11 AC and 11 EV as well as poison resistance. I also memorize Fireball, which is now at 16% failure. With that done, I take the stairs and hear the roar of battle (i.e. there's a bailey here). I decide to save magic mapping for later in the hopes of finding the bailey in time. I explore a bit and find 2 black bears along with a bunch of fungi and plants, which suggests the Lair is near. OTR and Mephitic Cloud do their work, but a komodo dragon appears, which takes a little more work. MP is definitely still a problem, and my melee damage sucks now, so I'll need to switch to staves reasonably soon. Staves have a 1.2 base delay, so I'll need 4 in Staves to attack safely with them, and Evocations will help improve their damage. I still need to get Fireball online, so I'll hold off on the training.

Some exploration leads to uneventful encounters, a few consumables, Spellcasting to 3, and a clue to the location of the bailey. I find a +2 rapier of draining as the creaking of a portcullis becomes quick. The rapier is likely better against living enemies, so I switch to it for now. As I head toward where I think the bailey is, sourceless malevolence drops me to D:11, so I'll have to miss out on the bailey.

Sourceless Malevolence

I explore a decent chunk of this level before finding any monsters. Nergalle and an orc wizard appear next to each other, so I move close enough to see a second orc wizard and cast Mephitic Cloud. I manage to confuse Nergalle and get a couple castings of OTR off, but the confusion wears off, so I use my last charge of acid before engaging Nergalle in melee. Fortunately, she's not dangerous in melee, so I kill her, bringing Fighting to 10 and Conjurations to 7. Fire Magic goes to 5 after I kill and unseen horror guarding the first upstairs I find, but Fireball is still at 12% failure.

The rest of D:10 and D:11

The upstairs brings me to where I first entered D:10, only there are now howler monkeys, vampire mosquitoes, and a bullfrog in the area. A combination of poison immunity, rN, and vampiricism render Fireball my only hope against the mosquitoes. I get 2 fireballs off, but they're both still there and are now in a position where I have to get myself in a fireball. Since they heal with each bite, and I have no other way to destroy them, I cast another fireball, or rather, I think about doing so because I'm out of MP. I drink a potion of magic before casting the fireball, which destroys both mosquitoes, leaving only a howler monkey, which is easy by now. As I approach the Lair entrance, several yaks appear, falling easily to several castings of OTR, taking me to XL 12 in the process. The random stat is Int this time. I also get Spellcasting to 4. Fireball is now at 9% failure in leather, so I turn Staves on to start getting their delay down to a safe level. The Lair entrance turns out to be in a small room with an orc warrior in it. I kill the orc warrior, but I won't go to the Lair yet.

I find a couple sleeping centaur warrior zombies, so I step out of their view and switch to the short sword before trying to stab them. One of them wakes up when I step back in, so I cast Fireball instead. Three fireballs soften them up before they get in melee range. I was standing in a corridor, so they fight one at a time, and I finish them off. I then find the bailey, which is closed and not where I thought it was. I find a trove later in D:10, and it requires a +5 demon trident. The center of D:10 is a Xom altar vault with a bunch of weak monsters, though a shadow takes a while to destroy without being much of a threat.

With D:10 complete, I return to D:11 and encounter Erica. I try a fireball and some poison, but that doesn't do much, so I retreat upstairs to try a different stair. It works, and I find a wand of mindburst. Later on, Ru offers another sacrifice. The choices are Hand, Nimbleness, and Artifice. These are all high-piety sacrifices that would notably affect my gameplay. Since I've had bad luck with finding evocables so far, I choose Artifice, bringing me to 5* piety and unlocking Apocalypse. The next encounter of note is a two-headed ogre, which is too close to effectively poison it to death, so I net it once I'm forced into melee. Actually, I miss with 2 nets and take a bunch of damage, so I use Draw Out Power before throwing my last net, which hits. I manage to kill it, though it broke free before dying. Staves goes to 2, and it's now clear that I'm underpowered. In the next room from where the two-headed ogre spawned is a vampire, a basilisk, and a cyclops. They spawn too far away for a Fireball, and I can't fight all three at once, so I retreat. The vampire follows me, so I move a good distance and switch to the short sword before engaging it in melee. The idea was to avoid waking up other monsters, but the vampire's heal-on-bite makes the fight unwinnable, so I Draw Out Power and retreat to consider my options. I can't get the vampire off me or poison it, which means I have to outdamage its healing somehow. I try a potion of might, but it's not enough, so I try a net. The first net misses, but the second one works.

Doomed

That fight with the vampire showed that I'm just plain weak. Poison works too slowly now, I suck in melee, and Fireball doesn't have much power yet. This means it's time for some scroll use. I start by enchanting the rapier of draining to +4. The rapier should be as good against undead as the short sword by now, and AC is low on my list of problems, so I drop the short sword. Next, I read from both of my stacks of 2 scrolls. These turn out to be fear and blinking. That's it for scrolls. Now it's time to continue.

D:11 continued

I start by going back to the room with the basilisk and cyclops. I try to stab the basilisk, but stealth fails. Fortunately, a large rock from the cyclops gets rudirected, letting me cast OTR with the cyclops close to death. I miss the basilisk twice in melee before I can get both it and the cyclops in a fireball, killing the latter. A shadow also enters the room, but a second fireball destroys it with the help of steam from the fountains in the room. I finish off the basilisk, but before I can rest, a skeletal warrior comes through the door in the south. There's no way I can fight that, so it's time for the Lair.

The rest of the game

After posting the pre-Lair portion of the diary, I realized the following:

• There was little interest in this type of project.
• Gameplay is much slower when writing for a diary.

Due to the above, I decided to discontinue the diary and play the character normally from now on.

That said, I thought I should give a summary of how the rest of the game went. I figured the midgame would be a struggle with only OTR, Fireball, Ru, and a weak melee draining attack to get me through. I continued training Fire Magic and Conjurations to get Starburst online, improve my Fireball, and eventually cast those spells in heavier armor. Along the way, I found Iron Shot, so I started training Earth Magic to have a way of dealing with fire resistant/immune monsters. Urug was in Lair:1, and Snorg was in Lair:5, so the branch was relatively light on uniques. I also saw a couple hydras but had no way to kill them, so I left them alone.

After the Lair, I did some dungeon cleanup, killing Gastronok and Maggie. Ru offered me a sacrifice, and I chose Armour, meaning I could no longer train that skill. That was enough to max out piety. I also bought an amulet of regeneration. D:12 had an ice cave, which I skipped. It also had a shop that sold the Storm Queen's shield, which I bought. After D:12 was Orc, which wasn't that tough. I managed to get a +3 slay hat to help a bit in melee, a demon trident to give to the trove once I enchanted it enough, and a couple scrolls of identify, which let me identify a scroll of acquirement. The acquirement was +1 gloves of strength, which was at least better than no ego, though +3 Str would only help with casting in armor for this build.

D:13 had a huge vault, which gave me several scares, but I was able to go down and complete D:14. D:15 had too much, so I went back to the Lair to try the S-branches. I got good rolls for those branches, as Spider of full of poison-vulnerable enemies, and my scarf of repulsion would make Shoals easier. I went to Spider first, but it was harder than expected, and I got confused in Spider:2 by a tarantella and got blown up by an orb spider.

Final Thoughts

Poison is fine in the early game, but this game convinced me that Venom Mage is a weak background, as poison falls off in effectiveness by mid-dungeon, but the skill training required to get the better poison spells online leaves a Venom Mage well behind the curve in terms of getting mid-late game viable spells online. It might be better for a Venom Mage to switch to a weapon relatively early to have a way to deal with poison-resistant and high HP enemies. Of course, a Venom Mage won't be as good with a weapon as a warrior background.